Welcome to the ongoing saga of my new life in Italy. Starting with an innocent masters program in gastronomic science, I was seduced subsequently into the dream of making a fine wine in the Marche. It's a work in progress, welcome to the story of Nascondiglio di Bacco,

Sunday, September 30, 2007

30 settembreIt is hard to believe another month has slipped by and autumn is upon us. We still don't have leaves with color, but I imagine it is just a short time away. We will start and finish, I hope, picking olives tomorrow and have an appointment at the pressing facility for our 250 olives! Just joking, but as I said before, it is a horrible year also for olives. Hopefully the cornucopia year will follow. We met with 2 new planters today and have one more appointment before we choose who to use for laying out and planting the vineyard. The 1st group was unable to help us because with high density planting as we want, the rows are too narrow for their tractor. We are hoping to do something quite a bit different from the norm in the southern Marche with our vineyard, grape selection, etc.I spent 3 days making a birthday cake for a friend of Raffaele who stayed with us this weekend along with her family and 2 other families whom Raffa had met through the scouting program.. In the coming years, I hope to prove to Raffaele I can cook (and bake). Anyway, the experience reminded me why I dislike baking! It was a lemon-pistachio crunch cake in 3 layers and for the masochists who read my blog who want to try it, you can find the recipe on Epicurious.com. It took 2 cows and 1 hen a week to make the ingredients, so I probably took a week off of everyone's life who ate some.The fotos are of a quasi full moon, drying grapes, the almost finished fermentation of my second harvest and my italian clothes dryer, which uses no energy and dries in 1/5 the time of a conventional dryer (if the wind is 40 miles/hour as it was the other day). Have a great week! I hope to get the pup a week from monday.dds